Feature Channels: Birds

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It is now widely accepted that birds are descended from dinosaurs.

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Animals must defend resources critical to their and their offspring’s survival. With few resources, tree swallows become more territorial, which likely increases testosterone allocation in their eggs. This may promote offspring aggression, a trait critical for survival in competitive environments.

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Collisions with glass windows on buildings, transportation shelters, noise barriers and fences are a major source of bird mortality.

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British Trust of Ornithology researchers call for better monitoring of soil invertebrates after new research, collating 100 years of data, suggests significant and previously undetected declines in UK earthworm abundance could have occurred.

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NAU professor Jeff Foster was recently awarded a grant by the DoD for a new study, “Demonstration of Metabarcoding for Monitoring Bird Species Habitat Quality on DoD Installations.” This three-year, $900,000 project will focus on five insectivorous species on four military sites.

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While most animals don’t learn their vocalizations, everyone knows that parrots do – they are excellent mimics of human speech. Researchers aim to add to what we know about animal vocal learning by providing the largest comparative analysis to date of parrot vocal repertoires.

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The European robin’s closest relatives are found in tropical Africa. The European robin is therefore not closely related to the Japanese robin, despite their close similarity in appearance.

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Un nuevo estudio que se presenta en la Reunión Científica Anual del ACAAI de este año muestra que un tratamiento que usa una tecnología de edición genética de repeticiones palindrómicas cortas, agrupadas y regularmente interespaciadas logró aliviar la inflamación y reducir la frecuencia de los ataques.

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For centuries, Indigenous communities in the American Southwest imported colorful parrots from Mexico.

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Scientists have so far found at least two genetic pathways leading to the same physical outcome: all-black feathers. This change was no random accident. It was a result of nature specifically selecting for this trait. The new study is published in the journal PLOS Genetics.

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A new species of owl has just been described from Príncipe Island, part of the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe in Central Africa.

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A study has found that Eurasian jays can pass a version of the ‘marshmallow test’ – and those with the greatest self-control also score the highest on intelligence tests.

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Hybrids of two common North American songbirds, the black-capped and mountain chickadee, are more likely to be found in places where humans have altered the landscape in some way, finds new University of Colorado Boulder research.

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A recent study, published in Current Biology, led by researchers at Stockholm University and Uppsala University, has shown that juvenile songbirds react to hearing the songs they will eventually produce as adults, even when they are as young as 12 days old.

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Zoologists from Trinity College Dublin, working with a research team in Indonesia, have found several new species of colourful, tropical sunbirds.